Our young son, Whit, is at one of those fun stages where he loves to look at himself in the mirror, an event which is made a great deal more interesting by the fact that one wall of our dining room has floor-to-ceiling mirrors. He likes to run into the room with his arms stretched behind him, in what I can only believe is an attempt to make himself aerodynamic. He rushes toward the mirrors and then just looks. Lauren and I can see the recognition in his eyes that the toddler right before him is, in fact, himself! (I cannot wait until Whit has enough words to explain exactly what he is thinking as he sees himself in those mirrors.)
Much of our understanding of just who God is can feel as though we are looking at a mirror. I do not mean the beautifully clear images of ourselves we see when we look in modern, silvered glass mirrors. Rather, I mean the looking glasses of the first century, which were constructed by hammering a sheet of metal, usually bronze or silver, into as flat a surface as possible before polishing it into a glossy sheen. Regardless of how well-constructed those mirrors were, they always contained distortions, resulting either from the work of the smith who had hammered the metal in the first place or from the inevitable tarnish that would later form on them. We see God in these same manner: distorted by our own perceptions and often tarnished through the views which others seek to place on our Creator.
The true beauty of this passage is in the reminder that one day we shall see “face to face.” This reminder is one aspect of the great hope we have been given through Jesus Christ. One day, we will see God clearly, as our Almighty Lord desires, neither dimly nor covered over with the finite nature of our minds, which seek to comprehend the Divine’s infiniteness.
As I watch my son make faces in the mirror in our dining room, I look forward to the day when I will see God as clearly as Whit now sees himself.